Organic & Fresh EVOO - What To Look For

Cockatoo Grove Organic Extra Virgin olive oil is the freshly squeezed juice extracted from fresh organically grown olives. When olives are pressed, the resulting oil is quite opaque and typically contains a very small amount of moisture and tiny olive flesh particles in suspension that naturally settles with time.

A small amount of these settlings, often referred to as sediment, can be found in Extra Virgin olive oil if it has been bottled when the oils were particularly fresh (within 1-2 months of harvest, coinciding with the time the oil is of the highest quality and contains the highest level of antioxidants). In terms of oil quality, this sediment is not viewed as a defect, just as sediment deposit in a bottle of red wine is not viewed as a defect. Sediment in our Extra Virgin olive oil is actually an indication that you are purchasing natural, chemical free Organic Extra Virgin olive oil that was freshly bottled and packed.

Our first bottling of Cockatoo Groves 2016 harvest Organic Extra Virgin olive oil (bottled between April and July 2016) was being packaged within 1-2 months of pressing. This oil would have been moderately cloudy at the time of bottling. While we use the highest micron filter, there will always be some particles that pass through. Since then, the particles of organic matter and water may have settled on the bottom of the container forming a natural sediment which may be evident.

Customers receiving some of these early release oils may question the quality of the oil due to the appearance of this sediment. The physical appearance of sediment in olive oil is quite distinctive, and tends to congregate at the base. This sediment is completely natural and is made up of organic matter from the olives, antioxidants and moisture. Whilst we understand the sediment may look unusual, the sediment is perfectly harmless and poses no health risk – it can also be easily removed from the oil by gentle decanting.